Sunday, October 16, 2011

Amanda Knox: All American Girl?

I, like so many other people in the world, was completely swept up in the story of Amanda Knox, An American exchange student accused of murdering and sexually abusing her Italian roommate, Meredith Kercher.
When Kercher's body was found dead, due to stab wounds in the throat, in November of 2007, Knox and her boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, where questioned by Italian police without the presence of their lawyers. Soon, both Knox and Raffaele were convicted of murder.

13 days ago from today, Amanda Knox was acquitted and released from Italian prison. As I watched her homecoming speech today, I am reminded of the issues surrounding her case, and it got me thinking about the way Americans look at, and evaluate infamous court cases.

I do not know if Amanda Knox is a murderer. Can anybody ever truly know?
But, there are some pieces of information that paint her in a certain light. For example, she would giggle and laugh when police were searching the room, or questioning her. She would break into yoga poses at inappropriate times. She even confessed to the murder, which she later claimed was due to duress.

Yet, as I watch her homecoming speech, all I can see is a young woman who family says avoids conflict, a young woman who made Dean's List, a young woman who is strikingly pretty, a young woman who loves her family, and a young woman who portrays the American girl next door. This illustrates the way many Americans evaluate characters. How do they fit in to our American ideals? I know I have heard many times amongst the buzz of her acquittal how happy people are to see her back with her family, where she belongs.

Does this seemingly All-American look radiate innocence? Why do we associate qualities we look for in the ideal "American" girl with innocence?
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2 comments:

  1. Joe F.October 17, 2011 at 9:49 PM

    I agree with you that, from a distance, Amanda Knox seems to embody innocence. However, I think it is interesting that the media didn't treat her as innocent No one knows for certain whether Amanda Knox is a murderer, but the media still portrayed her story as if she had already been convicted, creating a narrative of a guilty murderer. This case is similar to another high profile murder case, the Casey Anthony trial. In both incidents, the facts were far from clear, but both women were treated as guilty by public opinion.

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  2. Kathleen F.October 18, 2011 at 8:36 PM

    I actually didn't know about this story until I read your blog post and watched her homecoming speech. There is definitely an image in people's mind about the "all american person". There's the high school football player that does well in school and the girl next door who doesn't wear too much makeup. I think these images are played out in media like movies and television to give us an image of ourselves that certainly isn't all encompassing or necessarily definitive of our character as a nation. If I think back on our history as a nation, the period of the 50s strikes me as a time that really solidified this "all american image". The good housewife, working businessman dad, and obedient, well-meaning kids are images that come to mind. Shows like "Leave it to Beaver" definitely follow this model and my own dad talks about how it was like "in the old days" in terms of the innocence of the American image. As a nation, we still associate ourselves with that same image of innocence and purity but we don't account for the change we've gone through as a nation that has changed who we are.

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